Deadpool & Wolverine

 Hey, Hollywood. You missed me, didn't you? 

It's been six years and one corporate buyout since I, Deadpool, was in a movie. That's going to change now. And, oh look, I brought me a friend. He's been away from the movies longer than I have. Seven years, a year longer than me, but it's still longer! Say hello to Hughverine!

Help Me.

This is Deadpool & Wolverine. I'll leave it to him to tell you what it's about before I step in.

So, I've (Ryan Reynolds) been living my worst life ever since Deadpool 2. I broke up with my girlfriend, Vanessa, I got rejected from The Avengers (long story), and I'm a used cars salesman (and I'm not good at it!). But Mr. Paradox (Matthew Macfayden) of the TVA (Time Variance Authority, go watch Loki on Disney + for context!) sends his goons after me. He tells me that my timeline is deteriorating ever since its "anchor being" got himself killed, and he has a Time Ripper thingy to put it out of its misery. But he tells me that I can go to the "sacred timeline" and be part of the MCU. Sounds tempting, but I have another idea: replace my timeline's anchor being with another variant of himself. Who is this anchor being? It's the other guy in the title!

I eventually find a Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) of my very own. But Mr. Paradox tells me he's the worst Wolverine of them all, and not the fun kind of worst either. He sends us to the Void, a Mad Maxian wasteland filled with Marvel Movie characters Disney wants to forget. It's ruled by Cassandra Nova (Emma Corrin), Professor X's evil twin sister, and she doesn't want me or Wolvie to escape. Well, fortunately, there's a team of Marvel Movie characters that can help us. Oh yeah, and a whole lot of me's.

Everybody got that? 

Here's more.

It's been six years and Deadpool's sincere irreverence hasn't diminished with age. The film literally starts with Deadpool digging up Wolverine's adamantium skeleton, which he uses, piece by piece, against waves of TVA minutemen. It plays its brutality for laughs just as much as the other films. Among many examples, let's just say that the Wolverines Deadpool encounters before the main one aren't happy to see him. It still knows when it needs to be serious; you'll feel it when Wolverine confesses his greatest failure. Cassandra is treated as a serious threat, and Corrin's performance doesn't let us forget it.

Deadpool the character is still that same fun merc-with-the-mouth. He may be rude, crude, immature and brutal, but he still has a supporting cast that he sincerely cares for. You'll definitely feel it when he calls them his world. Wolverine is a great straight man for Deadpool; their disagreements lead to some of that comic brutality. He spends the movie learning his value as a hero, which he proves when he helps Deadpool stop the Time Ripper. Meanwhile, Macfayden hams it up spectacularly as Mr. Paradox, a seemingly intimidating bureaucrat who is just a paper tiger. 

This is a film pretty dependent on knowing its references. Chris Evans shows up, not as Steve Rogers, but as Johnny Storm from Tim Story's Fantastic Four movies. We get Wesley Snipe as Blade, Jennifer Garner as Elektra, Channing Tatum as Gambit (referencing the film he almost had), and Dafne Keen as Laura/X-23 for the Resistance. A lot of other cameos disappear into crowd shots, such as Billy Clements, tagging in for Kevin Nash, as the Russian from 2004's The Punisher, a film I never saw. Let's not forget all of Deadpool's meta-commentary. You might need an annotated book to get all of the in-jokes and cameos, because I don't think I can go through them here.

The technicals were all right. There's some great production design for the TVA HQ and The Void, the latter of which is literally littered with references (including a buried 20th Century Fox logo!). There are some good visual effects for our heroes' superpowers, though Cassandra running her fingers through her victims' heads has unpolished CGI. The best effects involved Deadpool and Wolverine tearing through an army of Deadpools in one long camera shot. Speaking of Wolverine, I'm sure a lot of viewers will appreciate his new costume, which approximates his classic yellow spandex suit into live action. I think it's all right, but I especially like his reason for wearing it. There's a decent score by Rob Simonsen, though I think you'll remember all the needle drops even more.

Welcome to the MCU, Deadpool (why thank you, kitty). Some may think that Deadpool & Wolverine's multiversal gimmick reeks of desperation, but I think it's a pretty brutal joke. You won't regret it if you can tolerate comic brutality and a multiverse of references. There's a lot I have to leave out for clarity's sake. But I'm sure you'll be surprised once you see it in action; just wait until you see who plays all the Deadpools. You can disagree with me once you see the movie. It's time to get to my next reviews.

Twisters

Phone Transcript

JETHRO: Hello?

(Unknown): Pop Quiz, Hotshot! There's a movie about tornados. It makes almost a half-billion dollars - that's in 1996 money, back when money was worth something - and was even nominated for two Academy Awards. It has a cast and crew of household names, including the author of the novel that became what was then the Highest. Grossing. Movie. Of. All. Time. A license to print money, I think, so what do you do? What do you do?

JETHRO: Wait twenty-eight years to make a sequel?

(Unknown): What?!

JETHRO: You're talking about Twister, right? It just got a sequel with Twisters.

(Unknown): OK, wise guy, tell me all about it.

JETHRO: Kate Carter (Daisy Edgar-Jones) and her team of storm chasers - Javi (Anthony Ramos), Addy (Kiernan Shipka), Praveen (Nik Dodani) and her boyfriend, Jeb (Daryl McCormick) - study twisters in Oklahoma. They think they can dissipate tornadoes by launching barrels of waterlock. They find a good test case, but it's much stronger than they anticipate, and all but Kate and Javi (who was miles away) are killed. 

Years later, Kate is a storm tracker at a NOAA office when Javi recruits her to help his company, Storm-Par, test their new weather scanner in Oklahoma. During their mission, they come across "storm wrangler" Tyler Owens (Glen Powell) and his storm chasers, who are off filming their latest meteorological adventures. The "city girl" and "country boy" initially don't get along, but they have to depend on each other to survive the ever-worsening tornadoes.

(Unknown): OK, OK, that's good. Tell me more.

JETHRO: The writing credits say it's "Based on Characters by Michael Crichton and Anne-Marie Curtin," but the only returning "characters" are the Dorothy probes used by Jo and Bill Harding (Helen Hunt & Bill Paxton). The probes are used by Kate and her first team in the prologue. Afterwards, Mark L. Smith's screenplay puts Kate and the audience through relatively unfamiliar narrative territory. I'm sure a lot of people will complain about the dissimilarities, but I haven't, for the story it tells is pretty decent.

(Unknown): How so?

JETHRO: Let's start with the characters. We don't get to know Kate's doomed storm chasers for pretty long. But we get to like them during that prologue and are perfectly gut punched when they are killed. They, Kate & Javi were that believable as longtime friends. Kate is quite compelling as she spends the movie owning up for her fatal miscalculations. She goes from panicking during one twister to helping citizens take shelter during the climactic monster tornado. Her survival is just as narratively satisfying as her theories finally working. 

Tyler and his "wranglers" introduce themselves as reckless glory hounds. But these storm chasers are anything but unlikable; their professional enthusiasm is endearing; their competence is impressive, and their altruism is inspiring. It's enough to make up for them accidentally running Kate and Javi off the road during their first storm chase. You'll be invested in Tyler and Kate's growing bond during their meteorological adventures. A lot. 

Now for a few others. It's later revealed that Storm-Par's financier, Marshall Riggs, is a bad guy. But he barely registers in the plot. Javi, however, perfectly sells us and Kate on Storm-Par's altruistic endeavors because he believes in them. So, we can sympathize with him even when he insensitively blames Kate for the fatal storm chase. He makes up for that by showing up his co-worker when the latter puts profit over people. Among the various bit characters, Jeff Swearingen was sympathetic as a doomed desk clerk, while Cody Paxton (Bill's son) and Lily Smith were less so as an ignorant couple. 

(Unknown): Hurry up.

JETHRO: Its relation to science is interesting. It explores a few concepts like the Fujiwara Scale, the Fujita Scale and why hiding under an overpass is a terrible idea. But it also has Tyler and his wranglers shooting fireworks into a tornado (which gave me the impression that they dissipated that tornado). In fact, Mother Nature is treated as a more palpable villain than Riggs himself. Either way, the cinematic twisters both look and sound perfectly menacing. Each one is more nightmarish than the last. The nighttime twister that disrupts a rodeo, and the climactic one that destroys a refinery - even creating a fire whirl - and later wrecks a movie theatre, are easily the most memorable. 

(Unknown): Hurry up!

JETHRO: There's some great Oklahoma scenery from cinematographer Dan Mindel, some excellent production design by Patrick Sullivan for the post-Twister devastations, and Benjamin Wallfisch's latest impressive score. 

(Unknown): Now!

JETHRO:  Who knows how scientifically accurate Twisters is, but it's still a pretty good blockbuster. It's worth paying even a few more dollars just to see the titular meteorological menaces on the biggest screens possible. It's also worth seeing it for the personalities on any screen. Give Twisters a spin and watch two hours spin right by. That's it for now. 

Who called?

Sasquatch Sunset

The Sasquatch, also known as The Bigfoot, and not to be confused with the Yeti, also known as the Abominable Snowman. Here, in the Forests of Northern California, we find four of them living their lives. Let's call them Alpha, Beta, Gamma and Mu. Alpha is, in human equivalence, a grumpy old man; Beta is the meeker male; Gamma is the lone female and Mu is the cub. All they have to do is to survive. So, let's follow them over a year in Sasquatch Sunset and see what happens.

I've been told that the Sasquatches are actually humans in disguise. Beta and Gamma allegedly go by the "real names" of Jesse Eisenberg and Riley Keough. I have been told that Mu is really Christophe Zajac-Denek. Alpha's alleged alias is Nathan Zellner, a filmmaker who frequently collaborates with his brother, David. If this is true, then the makeup team should be commended with the highest honors. It is difficult, if not impossible, to recognize them underneath their extensive makeup. I for one, choose to believe that this is a real cryptozoological family, and ...

Skip this nature documentary voice.

But, yeah, the film commits itself to a nature documentary aesthetic. It's a stunning travelogue of the California wilderness as photographed by Michael Gioulakis and accompanied by a score from The Octopus Project. Whether it's a serene misty morning in the redwoods or the town of Willow Creek, its scenery never ceases to amaze. The Zellners keep up their concept even as the film gets sillier and sillier. The Sasquatches are bewildered by fellow forest creatures; they even pass a turtle around like a telephone. The Sasquatches' first encounter with a road is treated like they just encountered a monster in a horror movie. It revels in its gross-out humor, and I wouldn't blame you if you averted your eyes during these protracted scenes.

Its relatively simple story gives its actors a lot to work with. In addition to the makeup, the actors have to communicate without the benefit of human dialogue. They instead communicate with grunts, roars, hollers and body language. So, rather than exposit about their loneliness, they whack trees with big branches and stare forlornly when they don't get a response. You can easily understand their listless lives even if you don't know what they're saying. Its premise may seem bizarre to some viewers, but you'll feel for these bigfeet when they're put into mortal danger. Indeed, not all of them will make it out alive, and some come dangerously close. A few viewings may be necessary to understand the nuances. But overall, I that the cast did well to get their points across.

Sasquatch Sunset isn't an easy film to describe. I wrote and rewrote this review several times before I got to this paragraph. But I think it's still an interesting film. It has a bizarre sense of humor, but an ultimately universal story of a family trying to survive hard times. Who knows if it will resonate with the Oscars as much as Everything, Everywhere, All at Once did, but its makeup designs are worth a look. See it if you want on your favorite streaming services. These not-Yeti will be ready if you do.

Onwards to the next review.

The Primevals

Are you ready for more yeti?

I streamed two films on Amazon today, though I think I'll have time for one review today. That lucky review is for The Primevals, a B-Movie that spent over fifty years in the making. No, I'm not kidding. It was spearheaded by famed stop-motion animator David W. Allen, who conceived it in the sixties, officially started production in 1978, actually started filming it in 1994 and died of cancer in 1999. Decades later, Charles Band, the film's producer, crowdfunded its completion.

This is the result.

Over in the Himalayas, the local Sherpa have a close encounter with an Abominable Snowman. The Yeti is killed when one of the Sherpa triggers an avalanche and its remains are brought to an American University for study. Dr. Claire Collier (Juliet Mills), the University's leading anthropologist, organizes an expedition to find the origins of this Missing Link. Her autopsy of the creature revealed its brain was tampered with. But by who?

Collier is joined by former student Matt Connor (Richard Joseph Paul), adventurer Rondo Montana (Leon Russom), young Sherpa Siku (Tai Thai), and scientist Kathleen Reidel (Walker Brandt). Their expedition leads them to a Lost World populated by more hominids and a race of sinister Lizardmen (that have me thinking of the Sleestaks from Land of the Lost). The Lizardmen don't intend to let our heroes get out alive. That's pretty much it.

Its protracted production is sometimes apparent. As I said, the live-action parts were filmed in 1994, but a few scenes, including a few in Siku's cabin, look much older. There's some obvious new computer displays when the party explore the not-Sleestaks' ship. There's also an egregious case of tell-don't-show when our heroes discover the aftermath of an attack on the hominids' village. Said village was in our heroes' line-of-sight when they set up camp. How did they not notice? On a storytelling perspective, the film never really explains how the first Yeti - there is another - got out. I can go on, but I can't. I also can't be too harsh on its imperfections considering the circumstances.

Thankfully, the creatures have aged pretty well. Allen, an Oscar-nominee for Young Sherlock Holmes and an animator for quite a few other films, left us some rather impressive stop-motion animation. There's also some modern effects work which blends surprisingly well with the old footage. Either way, the Yetis and Lizardmen move quite fluidly, and they blend pretty well with the live-action photography: no annoying chroma key washout or matte lines in sight! They are creatures with palpable personalities, so much so that the second Yeti is literally the best actor of the film. See, the Lizardmen have been brainwashing the Yetis into destructive monsters, and you'll feel for the Yeti as it fights its programming. These creatures really don't get much screentime, but it's a minor complaint.

What do I think of the human cast? They're all right. Collier and Connor seem to have sparks between them, even if their twenty-year age difference is beyond noticeable. Rondo Montana (what a name!) brings with him some likable charisma, while Kathleen's implied connections with the Sherpa are barely explored. Siku is determined to help the party after his brother was killed by the first Yeti. He nearly gets the group killed by provoking another Yeti, but is still a good character, and even gets a stellar big hero moment. The hominids, who are played by actors in makeup, are quite sympathetic when they're forced to fight the second Yeti in a gladiator match.

What else can I say about it? There's a pretty good score composed by Band's brother Richard. It's as melodramatic and bombastic as Max Steiner's work in the original King Kong; the opening chords may easily remind you of the older film's main theme. The non-creature effects, from matte paintings to laser blasts, blend with the actors as well as the creatures do. There's some good production design, with its best creation being the interior of the Lizardmen ship. Its Hominid Village is just a few buildings, but it's still an interesting enough locale.

I think The Primevals is at least worth a watch. For 91 minutes, you'll get a decent adventure story with astounding creatures and decent humans. Allen's filmography is astounding in its breadth, and despite some nitpicks, this film is a great legacy for him. If anything, this should make for an interesting study case along with other protracted productions like The Thief and the Cobbler. See it soon to see what I mean. I got to get Yeti for some Sasquatch tomorrow. 

Fly Me to The Moon

UPDATE: Revised a few things, including an awkwardly worded intro. But I still launched it initially in time for the exact minute.

If I time this right, then I will launch this review on July 16th, 2024, at 6:32 AM PST, 55 years to the exact moment Apollo 11 launched from Kennedy Space Center. How appropriate, then, that it's for Apple TV's latest theatrical release, Fly Me to the Moon. A few spoilers might be necessary, so let's blast off to the review.

Kelly Jones (Scarlett Johansson) is a con-artist who sells herself as a marketing genius. She catches the attention of Moe Berkus (Woody Harrelson), a secret agent man who sends her down to Kennedy Space Center as NASA's newest marketing specialist. It's up to her to sell the public on the looming Apollo 11 launch. But first, she has to sell her unorthodox methods to launch director Cole Davis (Channing Tatum) and his crew. She doesn't get off on the right feet with them when she hires impersonators to take interviews. But she and Cole eventually fall for each other as she secures funding from a few senators.

Moe soon orders Kelly to stage an "alternative" moon landing as a contingency. Kelly reluctantly brings along her usual director, Lance Vespertine (Jim Rash) and his crew, to rehearse and film "Project Artemis" at a NASA warehouse. Hilarity ensues, until Moe decides to broadcast Kelly's fake moon landing no matter what. How will Kelly get out of this ethical crisis? How does a black cat, named Mischief, figure into this?

Director Greg Berlanti (Love, Simon, Arrow) works from a script by Rose Gilroy that the credits state is "Based Upon the Story by Bill Kerstein & Keenan Flynn". It's an unusual credit listing for a comedy with an unusual running time at 132-minutes. The film lulls in a few places, while Project Artemis isn't even a plot point until an hour into the film. Yet, the film eases our patience with its leads' personalities. Kelly maybe a con artist, able to change names and accents at will, but her people skills are real. She gets a truly great monologue when she reveals her tragic backstory to Cole. Speaking of Cole, he's decently likable, but you truly feel for him once the film reveals his connections to the ill-fated Apollo 1. It's amusing to see them trade quips with each other, and while their meet-cute moment may have been heavily trailered, it's still fun to see it in context.

You’ll be hooked during the climax as editor Harry Jierjian sends our heroes on the final countdown. Kelly, Lance & NASA control guys Stu Bryce & Don Harper (Donald Elise Watkins & Noah Harper) make a mad dash to secure necessary equipment (with smash and grab!), Moe breathes down their necks, while Cole mans the control center. Once Apollo 11 lands, the film obfuscates the differences between Kelly’s broadcast and Apollo 11’s feed. “Which one’s real?” you’ll ask yourself. Let’s cut to the chase: the film makes it clear that it’s real. It’s truly heartwarming when Cole declares “that’s our guys,” while Moe is surprisingly graceful once he realizes the truth. It definitely sells how much an achievement the moon landing was.

Anyone else I should mention? Ray Romano and Anna Garcia are pretty likable as Cole & Kelly's respective confidants, Henry Smalls & Ruby Martin. The various actors playing the sympathetic senators, including an uncredited Victor Garber, made for some good cameos. Mischief was actually played by three different cats - Hickory, Wilbur, and Eclipse - and the end result is one entertaining kitty. You won't forget how he figures into the climax. Apollo 11's eventual blast-off is made nice and loud with some impressive sound design. Kelly's renovations to her "broom-closet" office makes for some great production design by Shane Valentino; his recreation of the control center is also striking. There's also a nice romantic score by Daniel Pemberton; his standout is the romantic theme for Kelly & Cole.

It maybe overlong but Fly Me to the Moon has a likable cast and a happy ending. What's not to like with a romantic comedy? I think it's worth a watch, but when? Maybe you'll want to watch it on Saturday to commemorate the moon landing. Or maybe you'll want to wait for it to stream on Apple TV, whenever that is. I don't know if you'll be over the moon for it, but I think you'll be decently entertained whenever and wherever you watch it. That's it for now.

Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 1 (?)

I've been putting off seeing Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 1 for the past few weeks. Well, no more, dudes! It's time to saddle up and see what everyone's been missing out on! Let's prove them city slickers wrong and that this is ...

... not the greatest movie in the world. Concept's fine, though, but not the execution.

This is Kevin Costner's first film as director since 2003's Open Range. An epic saga of development hell turned what was initially a single film into four, with Chapter Two coming out next month and Chapter Three already filming. At least, that was the plan, until Chapter Two was yanked off the schedule yesterday. Let's see what went wrong.

The film chronicles several different storylines in the Old West. The Lionshare of the story is centered around the San Pedro Valley in the settlement of Horizon. It's a place advertised as the ultimate destination for the settlers of the American Frontier. It's also in Apache territory, and the warrior Pionsenay (Owen Crow Shoe) is determined to drive the settlers away. He and his warriors start the film by killing the surveyors setting up Horizon by a river. The actual settlers build Horizon on the opposite side of said river. Pionsenay burns the town to the ground in a nighttime raid. A few settlers survive, including young Russell (Etienne Kellici), who brings with him a Union regiment to protect the survivors.

Meanwhile, in Montana, a frontierswoman named Lucy (Jenna Malone) shoots her ex-lover James Sykes and takes their baby with her. James's sons, Junior & Caleb (Jon Beavers & Jamie Campbell Bower), are dispatched to apprehend her. Lucy soon makes the acquaintance of prostitute Marigold (Abbey Lee) and horse trader Hayes Ellison (Costner), who help raise the baby with her. Also meanwhile, over on the Santa Fe Trail, Matthew Van Weyden (Luke Wilson) leads a wagon train to Horizon (remember, news travelled slow those days). That's pretty much it for that storyline. But there's a bunch of other story threads I'll discuss later on.

All of these storylines are jumbled around in its massive 181-minute timeframe. We get a massive cast of characters to keep track of; plenty of them are either too meh to care about or too dead before we get that chance. The guy who I least liked was some random dude at Horizon with an appallingly poor sense of gun safety. But I felt nothing when he got arrowed in the raid. Frances Kitteridge (Sienna Miller) survived the raid with her daughter, Elizabeth (Georgia MacPhail), but her husband and son (who don't) are forgotten about pretty quickly. A few scenes are dragged way out: it's more repetitive than tense when Caleb Sykes threatens Lucy and her husband Walter (Michael Angarano). Its attempts at humor are so jarring they seem to belong in another movie.

Did any of the story lines work? I think Costner and his co-writers, Jon Baird and Michael Kasdan, had a strong focus right with the Horizon plotline. That's where we get the most compelling character: Russell. For starters, it takes a lot of guts to outride the raiders in the night. He later joins Elias Janney's (Scott Haze) posse to get revenge on the Apache raiders. But while the posse decides to slaughter random Natives, not caring if they were Apache or even affiliated with Pionsenay, Russell can't bring himself to shoot a random man when the posse eggs him on. Him breaking the cycle of vengeance might form a good contrast with Pionsenay, though who knows now when, or if, we'll get to see that play out.

I wasn't moved that much, but I still have to respect John Debney's score here. It's got a good melancholic main theme and some perfectly intense music for the action scenes. There's some decent period makeup and hairstyling work on the cast. There's some good production design for the Frontier cities, particularly for pre and post raid Horizon, but it's J. Michael Muro's cinematography that really sells it as a big screen experience. The landscapes on display look perfect even if the story isn't.

The film's biggest problem is that it neglects itself for future installments. Its underdeveloped and numerous plotlines are clearly meant to make sense in one of the later sequels (or, in the case of the wagon train, saved for next time). But something's amiss when the groundwork for these plotlines is shaky. Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 1 ends on a montage of scenes from the next movie. I hope for Costner's sake that everything established here makes sense whenever we get to see it. But I can't imagine how this could be a tetralogy. A trilogy, maybe? But that's it for now.

Despicable Me 4

Gru and his Minions are back to take over theatres with Despicable Me 4. This time, they're supposed to battle cockroach-man Maxime Le Mal (Will Ferrell). But he's not their greatest enemy; the imperfect script is. I'm sure kids will love the zaniness, and while I had some fun with it, I still have some issues. Let's see what they are.

Gru (Steve Carell) and Maxime were classmates at the same School for Evil. They open the film at their class reunion, where Gru leads the Anti-Villain League in arresting Maxime. Maxime busts out within days and vows vengeance, not just for the arrest, but for a talent show spat back in the day. AVL-bigwig Silas Ramsbottom (Steve Coogan) sends the Gru family into what is basically witness protection. They get new identities as the "Cunninghams," with Gru/Chet as a Solar Panel salesman and Lucy/Blanche (Kristen Wiig) as a hairstylist. Oh, did I mention there's now a baby Gru Jr.? There is.

Meanwhile, the Minions (all Pierre Coffin) are drafted into the AVL, with five of them getting the Super Soldier treatment to become "Mega Minions." They're not very good Superheroes. But they might help when Maxime and his girlfriend, Valentina (Sofia Vergara) target Gru Jr. to get back at papa Gru. Also meanwhile, the new neighbor girl Poppy Prescott (Joey King), drafts Gru into her plot to steal the aforementioned School of Evil's mascot: Lenny the Honey Badger. What's a Gru to do?

My aforementioned issues come from its multiple plotlines. Sure, they may be comprehensive, but they're pretty underdeveloped. They never explain how the AVL drafted the Minions, considering that all but a few of them left Gru at the end of Despicable Me 3 for his brother, Dru. I'm pretty sure there wasn't a movie or short that explained it, either. Gru's adopted daughters - Margo, Edith and Agnes - have issues that never really pay off. Poppy's heist backfires when school Principal Übelschlecht (director Chris Renaud) tracks her down. But it never dwells on Lenny's cowering in her presence. The biggest flaw is Maxime's plotline; he spends most of the movie on silliness rather than being an on-screen credible threat. He only registers a bit credible once he finally gets to act. He even has an army of cockroaches, seemingly his equivalent of the Minions, who literally do nothing! Next...

Now for stuff that I liked. The Mega Minions are amusing even if they barely affect the plot. Their designs are delightfully silly, as are their various super-fails. It's especially funny when they're marginally successful! Them being the cavalry when Maxime has already been defeated is actually a pretty good punchline to their joke. Lucy's only day on the job ends catastrophically for a customer, Melora (Lorraine Newman) and the salon. Melora chases Lucy down at the grocery store, complete with snippets from The Terminator theme, in a surprisingly thrilling chase. I wasn't exactly amused by Edith and Agnes's blowhard karate teacher, which wasn't helped by me being in the front row, but I was amused when Agnes stood up to him. Poppy is a fine new character, though Lenny is by far the MVP of the new characters.

Despicable Me 4 isn't that interested in catering to its oldest audience members. But you know what? It's a nice diversion from the heat. I wasn't bored with it, even as I noticed how underdeveloped its plotlines were. I was still impressed with its few surprises, particularly The Terminator gag. Maybe you'll be surprised to if you make it your latest summer family matinee. If not, you can at least take comfort in its 95-minute runtime. Minions are fine, but we don't need three hours of them...

There's a three-hour movie in my future, isn't there?